So, death penalty
- Thread starter David Bjur
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I believe that the death penalty is unacceptable since it means the government gets to decide who is allowed to live. We can't even exist without their permission. If you can keep someone in prison for the rest of their lives, do that instead. Especially since the risk that someone innocent will get killed just is too horrible a risk to take.
No one deserves death. If you're crimes are severe enough the worst punishment you should be given is life in prison. Which if you ask me is much more horrifying than a quick painless death.
Besides, plenty of innocent people get offed that way. It's rather stupid and it accomplishes nothing other than saving the amount of money it would take to clothe and feed a person for the rest of their lives. Which, unless you're going to start offing people for every little offense is not worth the cost.
Edit: I don't fully understand all the debate around this. Most people who claim people should be killed because it's more merciful also make the argument that people who killed other people (or something like that) deserve to be killed. It's a bit of a contradiction.
Look at the options here:
A: Someone does something bad and you kill him. He'll never be able to harm another person again.
If you find out hes innocent, you're pretty much fucked there mate.
B: Someone does something bad and you imprison him for life. He'll never be able to arm another person again, and if you find out he's innocent you can just let him go.
I keep telling people morality shouldn't matter as much in the legal system as logic and basic human pshychology.
Besides, plenty of innocent people get offed that way. It's rather stupid and it accomplishes nothing other than saving the amount of money it would take to clothe and feed a person for the rest of their lives. Which, unless you're going to start offing people for every little offense is not worth the cost.
Edit: I don't fully understand all the debate around this. Most people who claim people should be killed because it's more merciful also make the argument that people who killed other people (or something like that) deserve to be killed. It's a bit of a contradiction.
Look at the options here:
A: Someone does something bad and you kill him. He'll never be able to harm another person again.
If you find out hes innocent, you're pretty much fucked there mate.
B: Someone does something bad and you imprison him for life. He'll never be able to arm another person again, and if you find out he's innocent you can just let him go.
I keep telling people morality shouldn't matter as much in the legal system as logic and basic human pshychology.
The degree of civilisation in a society can be judge by observing its prisoners.
Britain leaves its prisoners alive. It houses them, it feeds them, it provides them with therapy, medication, health care, schooling for some, drug rehabilitation, some lower security prisons allow their prinsoers out on social events and activities to keep them from becoming too institutionalised. Britain spends millions, possibly even billions depending on how you want to work out the costs, on keeping murderers and rapists and paedophiles alive.
America makes them wait for years, sometimes decades, with the constant knowledge of death, and the occasional knowledge of innocence, hanging over them. Then they are taken into a small room and strapped to a bed. They are given a drug called sodium thiopental, which it has been argued is too short acting, and can wear off leading to anaesthesia awareness, where the victim is unable to move but still fully aware of what is going on around them. This drug is not administered by a doctor, since it has been shown that no doctor will even help with demonstrations for lethal injection, since it is in oppoisition to the Hippocratic Oath.
Let me repeat that for those of you in the cheap seats. The person administering your lethal injetion could be any prison employee. He might have no experience with injections, or the methods of determining whether you are truly anaesthetised. In a 2005 study by the University of Miami they found that 88% of victims were not given enough sodium thiopental. The option that isn't sodium thiopental? Massive barbiturate overdose. Imagine dying in a manner similiar to that of Uma Thurman in drug overdose in Pulp Fiction. Vomiting, choking, crying, blood pouring from your body, probably voiding yourself. And of course, since the mid-70s (when the death penalty was reinstated) there are at least 39 people who have been executed despite evidence that they could have been innocent (and some who definitely were)
The degree of civilisation in a society can be judged by observing its prisoners.
Britain leaves its prisoners alive. It houses them, it feeds them, it provides them with therapy, medication, health care, schooling for some, drug rehabilitation, some lower security prisons allow their prinsoers out on social events and activities to keep them from becoming too institutionalised. Britain spends millions, possibly even billions depending on how you want to work out the costs, on keeping murderers and rapists and paedophiles alive.
America makes them wait for years, sometimes decades, with the constant knowledge of death, and the occasional knowledge of innocence, hanging over them. Then they are taken into a small room and strapped to a bed. They are given a drug called sodium thiopental, which it has been argued is too short acting, and can wear off leading to anaesthesia awareness, where the victim is unable to move but still fully aware of what is going on around them. This drug is not administered by a doctor, since it has been shown that no doctor will even help with demonstrations for lethal injection, since it is in oppoisition to the Hippocratic Oath.
Let me repeat that for those of you in the cheap seats. The person administering your lethal injetion could be any prison employee. He might have no experience with injections, or the methods of determining whether you are truly anaesthetised. In a 2005 study by the University of Miami they found that 88% of victims were not given enough sodium thiopental. The option that isn't sodium thiopental? Massive barbiturate overdose. Imagine dying in a manner similiar to that of Uma Thurman in drug overdose in Pulp Fiction. Vomiting, choking, crying, blood pouring from your body, probably voiding yourself. And of course, since the mid-70s (when the death penalty was reinstated) there are at least 39 people who have been executed despite evidence that they could have been innocent (and some who definitely were)
The degree of civilisation in a society can be judged by observing its prisoners.
I say kill them. It is better to kill them now than hold them in prison for 50 years until they die.
I am generally against the death penalty, because if you execute someone, and it's later found out to be a mistake....WHOOPS! You can't reverse it. You cannot release them and compensate them for their time in jail. No, they're DEAD.
So, based on that, and the fact that I very much dislike the idea of stooping to their level by killing them...I'm pretty much against it, except under VEEERY specific circumstances.
Someone like that is incapable of reform, or regret, and is incredibly likely to re-offend just for "the lulz". People like that, who can't be cured...Yeah, you put those people down.
Oh, and I support the DP for people who are proven to have ordered Genocides. If you can prove that someone deliberately ordered and carried out the attempted murder of an entire country/race/etc....Yeah, you need to come down HARD on them. In fact, I'd go one further than the Death penalty for those guys. Wipe their names from every damn history book, every register, every record you can possibly remove. In the eyes of history, they should be a non-person, referred to only as "the genocider of XYZ (whatever they tried to eliminate)"
So, based on that, and the fact that I very much dislike the idea of stooping to their level by killing them...I'm pretty much against it, except under VEEERY specific circumstances.
This. Very much this.BiscuitTrouser said:
Someone like that is incapable of reform, or regret, and is incredibly likely to re-offend just for "the lulz". People like that, who can't be cured...Yeah, you put those people down.
Oh, and I support the DP for people who are proven to have ordered Genocides. If you can prove that someone deliberately ordered and carried out the attempted murder of an entire country/race/etc....Yeah, you need to come down HARD on them. In fact, I'd go one further than the Death penalty for those guys. Wipe their names from every damn history book, every register, every record you can possibly remove. In the eyes of history, they should be a non-person, referred to only as "the genocider of XYZ (whatever they tried to eliminate)"
Abso-fucking-lutely think it's the right thing to do. And you know what? I am well aware that it doesn't solve anything.
Sorry, but the freak over here who likes to dress up as a clown and rape and kill his victims who are sometimes children in a horrific way does not deserve to live (even though I don't actually think that guy got the death penalty). Taxpayer dollars should not go to keeping someone fed and clothed for the rest of his life, no matter how uncomfortably he has to live. His life is forfeit. He needs to be taken out of the picture. He has just become a burden to society that people expect us to keep alive.
It's safer, and quite frankly, much more ethical to just give them the lethal injection.
Oh shit, a famous actor has an opinion about it? You people need to realize that yes, it is a punishment. We are "torturing" the person both psychologically and physically. Because we are fucking punishing them.
I absolutely agree we need to be more lenient about it. Any remote inkling of innocence should result in them getting a lighter sentence. And the severity of the crimes should be much more thoroughly analyzed. But like in the Brevik case? Who apparently is going to only get 21 years in prison.
That right there is what sickens me. Letting a mass murderer walk. A man who killed over 70 people who is going to end up taking advantage of the justice system. Who isn't even deemed insane.
Fuck that. I don't know what fantasy world you guys are living in, where you can ignore three men killing a pleading guy with a hammer for 10 minutes and putting the video on the internet to fucking brag about it, but that's ridiculous.
Sorry, but the freak over here who likes to dress up as a clown and rape and kill his victims who are sometimes children in a horrific way does not deserve to live (even though I don't actually think that guy got the death penalty). Taxpayer dollars should not go to keeping someone fed and clothed for the rest of his life, no matter how uncomfortably he has to live. His life is forfeit. He needs to be taken out of the picture. He has just become a burden to society that people expect us to keep alive.
It's safer, and quite frankly, much more ethical to just give them the lethal injection.
Oh shit, a famous actor has an opinion about it? You people need to realize that yes, it is a punishment. We are "torturing" the person both psychologically and physically. Because we are fucking punishing them.
I absolutely agree we need to be more lenient about it. Any remote inkling of innocence should result in them getting a lighter sentence. And the severity of the crimes should be much more thoroughly analyzed. But like in the Brevik case? Who apparently is going to only get 21 years in prison.
That right there is what sickens me. Letting a mass murderer walk. A man who killed over 70 people who is going to end up taking advantage of the justice system. Who isn't even deemed insane.
Fuck that. I don't know what fantasy world you guys are living in, where you can ignore three men killing a pleading guy with a hammer for 10 minutes and putting the video on the internet to fucking brag about it, but that's ridiculous.
[/quote]
I have no other option but to live in countries I cannot fully control. Except for suicide. Do try thinking before you post for once?
I also can do nothing effective about it. Lack resources. Reaping benefits is also out of my control.
And there is no hypocrisy involved.
[/quote]
You could protest.
You could write letters to your congressmen or women as well as the president.
You could move to a country that doesn't commit the acts you find abhorrent.
You could start or join a group dedicated to finding peaceful ways of fixing these problems.
You could actually try to fix these problems yourself by pursuing a career in which you can influence public opinion(writer, musician, politician).
The list goes on.
So yeah...you kinda are being hypocritical.
Edit: damn quote fail
I have no other option but to live in countries I cannot fully control. Except for suicide. Do try thinking before you post for once?
I also can do nothing effective about it. Lack resources. Reaping benefits is also out of my control.
And there is no hypocrisy involved.
[/quote]
You could protest.
You could write letters to your congressmen or women as well as the president.
You could move to a country that doesn't commit the acts you find abhorrent.
You could start or join a group dedicated to finding peaceful ways of fixing these problems.
You could actually try to fix these problems yourself by pursuing a career in which you can influence public opinion(writer, musician, politician).
The list goes on.
So yeah...you kinda are being hypocritical.
Edit: damn quote fail
Is it used too much? Probably. Buy my opinion on it is that some people just need to die. Not all the people who are on Death Row, but there comes a point in your killing/raping/whatever spree where it's just not worth the money keeping you alive for forty more years. Where exactly that is can be up for debate, but in my mind it exists.
Agreed, even with that 100% certainty, I'd still be against it.Woodsey said:
An eye for an eye, as they say.
You'd gladly volunteer to kill someone?Liquidacid23 said:
Kind of scary, dude.
[sub]Hypocritical too...[/sub]
If you don't believe in an afterlife, then the idea of completely erasing someone from existance (for all intents and purposes) makes the death penalty tempting.It also makes it appear that the more heinous criminals, the ones who took some sweet time with their victims, are getting off quite easily. Once they're dead, they are dead, and they can't suffer anymore, so rather than actually punishing them, you instead cut to the chase and put them in the ground without letting them have an incident with Bubba in the showers. It feels like they could have paid a higher price. Death, it seems to me, is not the worst thing one can suffer. I am therefore torn between a yes and no.
Also, I keep on seeing people say that the death penalty should only be used when the court is absolutely sure they did it. Technically, "beyond any reasonable doubt", which I know is the standard in Canada and the US, means that in theory, if not practice, if you're convicted, it's because the prosecutor put forward so strong a case, which the defense failed to discredit any part of, that barring the arrival of a new fact unbeknownst to either prosecutor or defense (the defense here is entitled to every shred of evidence and information the prosecutor will be using to make their case) during the trial or afterwards, that the court has no choice but to conclude that you did, in fact, do it. They're not supposed to convict people who "probably" did it but in whom guilt is at all suspect. It probably doesn't always work like that in reality but unless the system is different in Austrialia or Europe (a difference which I believe to be a deep flaw on Australia and Europe's part if true) then the "not unless we're really sure" arguement rings hollow to me.
Also, I keep on seeing people say that the death penalty should only be used when the court is absolutely sure they did it. Technically, "beyond any reasonable doubt", which I know is the standard in Canada and the US, means that in theory, if not practice, if you're convicted, it's because the prosecutor put forward so strong a case, which the defense failed to discredit any part of, that barring the arrival of a new fact unbeknownst to either prosecutor or defense (the defense here is entitled to every shred of evidence and information the prosecutor will be using to make their case) during the trial or afterwards, that the court has no choice but to conclude that you did, in fact, do it. They're not supposed to convict people who "probably" did it but in whom guilt is at all suspect. It probably doesn't always work like that in reality but unless the system is different in Austrialia or Europe (a difference which I believe to be a deep flaw on Australia and Europe's part if true) then the "not unless we're really sure" arguement rings hollow to me.